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His security team looked dubious but didn’t argue as Leandro ran to the stairs and took them two at a time, bellowing, ‘Tomaz!’

He had opened and slammed the first two doors on the corridor when the one at the end opened. Leandro reached it in seconds and forcibly removed the body blocking his entrance, which happened to belong to the terrified blustering Count.

Forced against the far wall by the hand pressed to his chest, the blustering died a death in the face of the fury etched in the expression of the man holding him there.

‘You have a choice—you can carry on talking or you can resign from the Council in the morning, after which you will never, and I mean never, set foot in the Palace again. You have a country estate…?’ The older man nodded. ‘I suggest you go there because if I see your face again, I just might forget that I am a civilised man.’

‘But—’

‘The alternative is you carry on talking and I have you arrested. You went too far this time. I have samples of the food, which is tainted with a cocktail of powdered nut. I think the charge would be attempted murder.’

The colour drained from the man’s florid face as panic set in. ‘I thought a little stomach upset…’ He gulped. ‘No one was meant to die…it was just a little joke…’

‘I am not laughing.’ He stared at the white-knuckled hand he had stretched out towards the man and, sucking in a deep calming breath, let it fall. ‘The morning, Tomaz, on my desk. You want to spend more time with your family… God help them.’

With one last look of icy withering disdain, he swept from the room.

His waiting escorts said nothing, just followed respectfully in his wake. At the car he had driven here in he paused, looked down at his shaking hand and expelled a long shuddering sigh.

‘I think it best if one of you drives me back.’

It gave him time to calm down, and to think. It was hard to escape the fact that he was responsible for what had happened. He had brought Elsie here. He was as selfish as his father, he decided with self-disgust.

If she had died… An image of her face as she’d struggled for breath flashed into his head, along with the memory of the gut-churning fear and helplessness he had experienced, and he groaned, completely oblivious to the questioning look the driver sent his way.

He wished like hell he had never brought her here. He’d have given anything to go back to that simpler time when all he had to worry about was keeping his damned throne.

Even now, he hadn’t got the guts to put a name to the wanting he felt around her. To acknowledge those feelings, he’d have to acknowledge what his life would be without her in it. If he actually cared for her, he’d send her away.

At what point had the boundaries he had set to enable this to work blurred? It wasn’t as if he hadn’t been conscious of the danger signs, her attempts to deepen their relationship, to draw him out, maybe humanise him.

He hadn’t responded—he had ignored.

* * *

The consultant was outside her room when Leandro arrived the next morning to pick Elsie up. The man immediately bowed.

‘Your Majesty…would it be possible for me to have a private word before you go in?’

Leandro’s brows drew into a suspicious frown. ‘She is being discharged?’

‘Oh, yes, indeed. This way, sir.’

In the office, Leandro refused the seat that was offered and waited, not bothering to hide his impatience as the other man rearranged the neatly lined-up pencils on his desk.

‘When Princess Elsie was admitted, we took a medical history—’

‘She has an allergy to nuts, we know this.’

‘Yes, indeed she does, and otherwise she is quite well, but there are some results that I would like to discuss when we see her again. Would it be possible for you to be with her?’

‘What do you need to discuss that makes you think she will need my support?’

‘There is no need for alarm—’

‘Well, I am alarmed,’ Leandro cut in. ‘Discuss them with me.’

‘Oh, that would be most improper, Majesty.’